The wedding date had been set for six months out. The honeymoon was planned. They were going to Hong Kong. Now they were picking out invitations, and caterers and tasting wedding cakes all over town. Peter found it exhausting but Leanne was excited and glowing more with each passing day. He could deny her nothing that made her that happy. It had only been two weeks. He couldn't imagine what it was going to be like as the months ticked away.
"Honestly whichever invitation you like we'll use. I promise you I … I have no real opinion about them. Other than one of them needs to be in Braille." He said.
"Are you sure? I want you to feel involved in this."
Peter kissed her. "I feel involved. I am involved. But this particular decision... I don't mind not being involved in, please, please make this decision for me. And don't think for a minute that won't be happening ever again. For the next 60 years, I will be deferring decisions to you. Consider it an advanced peek into what life is going to be like with me."
She laughed. "Alright." She looked them over and chose one in a deep red with the dragon and phoenix embossed in an opalescent white. "This one," she said setting it by the phone on her desk and tucking the rest away in a drawer. They had set up her office in the back of the Kwoon they had started in the building across the street from Peter's home.
"I like that one," He said with a nod. "Mom can see the embossing."
"And I will make sure one of them is done in braille." She said.
"Thank you. I am going to go now. You have a session soon and I have to make my rounds and then get my Tang Jacket fitted. You know usually, it's the bride that has fittings, not the groom." He said as he left her office and started his rounds.
He had started this habit because he remembered going with his father while he made his rounds. He had a pattern not so much to remember it but so that the people he ministered to would know when he was coming and that he always came.
He walked through the merchant area, moving the crate of fruit for Mrs. Chen, as he always did on delivery day, she rewarded him with an apple. He stopped in to speak with Mr. Hsaio, who was 90 years old and still running his cafe. He was given a cup of tea while he talked to the elderly man who had no family in the States. It never ceased to amaze him how much of his 'work' was just showing someone a friendly face, menial tasks, conversation, and the occasional remedy procured from the Ancient or Leanne. Occasionally people came looking for Caine in Chinatown for help with bigger matters. Dangerous matters, but that wasn't the bulk of his job. Speaking, listening, and doing whatever was needed not only made others feel better but it gave him a feel for the pulse of Chinatown.
After he stopped into most of the shops and spoke with those within, he started into the residential area to check in on the elderly and shut-in. His father had introduced him to them before he left so he would know where they were and they would know he was leaving. He didn't know why but it had made him think about the old wives' tale that you had to tell the bees when someone died and it sent a chill down his spine.
He walked across the street from where he had intended to go. He had noticed the white van that followed him and didn't want a fight right in front of a 93-year-old woman's house. She'd already been in the hospital for one heart attack. No need to cause her another.
He had turned the corner as if he had intended to go that way in the first place. When he heard the van's door sliding open, he turned to face his soon-to-be opponents. " You boys really need to learn some new techniques. You're getting predictable."
Two men advanced on him, and Peter stood his ground. There was no point in running. He'd just have to have the same fight, only tired. At first, it seemed like just another fight, little more than sparring, which made him wonder what they were up to.
Then the knives came out. Small thin blades. At first, Peter was able to dodge, and use swift kicks to keep them far away from his soft and squishy innards. Then the blade slashed his calf deeply another slashed at Peter's back. With each wound, he became weaker, yet they never once went for the killing blow. 6 slashes to his leg, chest, arms, shoulder blades and lower back. One final blow knocked Peter to the ground and the men left as quickly as they had come.
Peter forced himself to his feet and then stumbled forward, he needed to get home, get to the Ancient, to Leanne. They would know what to do. The world swam in his vision, his heart pounded loudly and unevenly in his ears. He fumbled for his cell phone in his pocket and nearly dropped it. He made it to the end of the block and sank to the ground next to a tree. He found Leanne's number at hit dial. The phone slipped from his hands and clattered to the ground. He slumped to the side and lay next to it.
"Hey, handsome, What's up?" Leanne said into the phone, "Peter?" she asked. "Peter?" She could hear what sounded like a quiet moan. "Hold on okay, I'm coming... I'll find you," she said and left the Kwoon at a run. She knew he wouldn't be in the merchant district, it was too quiet in the background.
She looked down every alley as she hurried down the street, still holding the phone to her ear, just in case the background noises matched what she could hear around her. "Hold on, Peter... please hold on." She said, "God where are you?"
She found The Ancient seated at an outdoor table sipping a cup of tea. "Peter's hurt... and can't tell me where he is... do you know his Tuesday route? I'm always getting the days mixed up." She asked on the verge of tears. Something was seriously wrong. She could feel Peter weakening.
"Tuesday..." the ancient said quietly, worriedly, then after searching his brain for a moment... "Yes, this way."
They hurried through China town and once again she was impressed with how fast the ancient moved when he needed to. They found Peter on the ground, barely conscious. She put her phone away in her pocket and picked his up from the ground and put it in her pocket as well.
"His wounds are not deep." Lo Si said as he looked him over.
"Poison... " Peter said, weakly. "I … think I'm bait."
"Then let's get you back to your place and off this hook, they have you on." She said. She and Lo Si helped him up off of the ground.
Peter cried out in pain but managed to stand with their help.
"you need to keep your heartbeat slow." Lo Si said. "As slow as you can, as your father taught you. It will slow the poison in your system."
Peter nodded and closed his eyes. He focused on slowing his breathing, and his heartbeat, hearing them in his ears, getting fainter, shallower until they were nearly imperceptible even to him.
They moved as quickly as possible to Peter's home. They got him onto his bed and Leanne removed his clothing quickly to start examining the angry red wounds.
She went to the bathroom and got his box of q-tips as well as a bowl of warm water and a washcloth. She returned to the bedroom to find Lo Si lighting candles around the room. Incense was already burning. She didn't ask for details. They weren't important. Lo Si knew what he was doing.
She climbed onto the bed next to her fiance, her lover, and used the q-tips to clean out the wounds, to collect blood to try and find out what poison was used. Taking him to the hospital would do no good. They had no knowledge of Sing Wah poisons. Neither did she but she had her grandfather's notes.
"It's going to be alright." She told Peter as she worked.
"Promise me," He said, his voice whisper soft "That you won't go get the book. I'm bait."
She stroked his hair. "I don't need those books. I have his notes on medicines and poisons here." She said, then kissed his brow, and began to clean the wounds. "Just focus on your heartbeat, keep it slow, keep your temperature cool to give us time to work to find a cure."
He nodded slowly and closed his eyes "I love you, Li Na."
There was a slight change in his voice that drew Lo Si's attention sharply and he began to understand what it was that he had not been able to see.
"I love you too, Peter." She got up from the bed, taking the cue tips into the apothecary, where she took down her grandfather's notebooks as well as her own.
"You have something in mind?" Lo Si asked as he joined her.
She handed over one of her grandfather's books. "There is a section in there on Sing Wah poisons." She said as she took down several jars and put them on the table "There should still have been traces in the blood in the wounds. So we have several chances at sorting out the poison." She knew that if it was in his system for long there would be no tracing it. "You take half and I'll take half."
Lo Si nodded and looked through the journal until he found the section on poisons. He noticed the other book that she had, and it was written in a delicate feminine script even if it looked to be as old as the one he flipped through he was certain that it was hers.
He took one of the q-tips and began the process of testing small bits of bloody cotton.
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Matthew smiled at his son indulgently but took the cup he gave him.
"It will help." Kwai Chang said.
"Then I will drink it if you tell me what is troubling you. I am pleased to see you, but I know you did not come merely to visit an old man."
"My meditations of late have been of your father." Kwai Chang said as he took a seat near Matthew.
"You share his name, his face, his calling. It does not surprise me that he comes to you in your meditations."
"They are not communications. They are glimpses into the past. Did he ever speak of loving a woman other than Grandmother? A Chinese woman?"
"He was not a celibate man. There were many women in his life before my mother. Many of them Chinese."
"I doubt he would show me a simple love affair. It hardly seems worth the qi to send." He said "The name was Li Na. I got the impression it was serious."
"Ah... now that name is familiar. One of his regrets."
"You promised to drink the tea, father." Kwai Chang nudged.
Matthew laughed quietly and then dutifully sipped at the herbal tea. "He did love the girl. She was half-Chinese as well, but he was still on the run at the time. He had promised to wed her, made arrangements with her grandfather... and then he had to run because the people in town had found out there was a bounty on his head and her grandfather would not allow that she would go with him. I do not know why you would have visions of this love affair. But visions are seldom made clear in the beginning."
Kwai Chang nodded "I have noticed this yes." He said, "In the meantime, I would like to remain with you until the end." They both knew it was coming. The nurse knew it was coming. Whether it was the next day, the next month, or the next year, no one could know.
"I would like that very much." He said with a smile. "Perhaps your brother will join us."
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"Here." The Ancient said "This is our poison. Now we can only hope there is enough time to get the cure into him."
She nodded and moved quickly once he had shown her the results. "Alright... we have most of what we need here." She said looking through the powders, herbs, and tinctures Kwai Chang Caine had left behind. She scribbled down a note of what was missing from the cure. "Do you have this in your supplies?"
He took the list. "Yes. I will return quickly."
She nodded "I'll get the rest of it put together." She said and put the water on to steep the ingredients she had on hand. She then went up to Peter's room and sat on the bed beside him.
"Hey." He said weakly. He leaned into her touch as she caressed his face.
"We've found what poison they used. Lo Si is going to get the few things we need for the antidote."
"So tell me doc, what are my chances?"
"I don't know." She said honestly. "I hope that slowing your heart rate has slowed the poison giving us more time... Peter... spend the rest of my life with me." She said.
"I thought I already proposed to you." He said, "I keep my promises."
She shook her head. "You misunderstand." She said it again, "Spend the rest of my life with me. I cannot bear the thought of losing you, not now, not ever."
"Not now, it's what they want. They're trying to drive you to the books so they can find them. I can't let that happen because of me." He swallowed hard, his mouth was so dry. Ask… ask me on our wedding day,"
She nodded " I love you." She told him and kissed him gently. "I need to get back to the kitchen. This will work, Peter... it will work. Keep your heart slow, you have to buy us more time."
He nodded and lay his head back against the pillow. It was hard to concentrate, hard not to think about the pain he was in, or the white-hot heat that seared its way through his body, and how hard it was to breathe.
His mind drifted, floated, and did everything but what he wanted it to do. He was 13 years old again and trapped in the burning temple. " Father!" He called out, pushing himself up off of the floor. "Father where are you!" he saw his father briefly through the smoke and chaos. "Father!"
He moved forward, stopping only to help one of the other boys to his feet, then moved forward again. He collapsed on the ground and was carried out by two of the monks.
He dreamed of the hospital, and Master Ping Hai telling him his father was dead.
The voice... he knew that voice... Not only from his lessons as a boy, not only from the temple...
Leanne was the first one up the stairs and into his bedroom. She moved him into a sitting position and slid behind him to prop him up. Lo Si sat to the side and held the cup with the antidote to his lips.
"You must drink, Peter," he said.
"nn-no." Peter protested, looking at the ancient with new eyes. His father had said Ping Hai had done it to protect them both from Tan. Had he? Why did he hide who he was? What else was he hiding.
"You must." Leanne said "Please. I can't lose you. Drink."
He looked over his shoulder briefly at her then nodded and let them pour the elixir down his throat. He relaxed back against Leanne and closed his eyes. Neither of them left his side through the night, watching him sleep a dreamless sleep. His fever broke and his breathing came easier. The wounds look less angry and she finally felt comfortable applying salve and bandaging them, putting in stitches where they were needed.
"I think he's out of the woods." She said, "He just needs to sleep now."
Lo Si nodded "I will return this evening and we will give him a second dose of the antidote just to be certain."
She nodded "I think that is a very good idea."
"You should rest too. It has been a long trying day." He said getting up from the chair near Peter's bed. "You did well today Leanne. You will make exactly the type of wife Peter needs in his life. I am pleased for you both." He said and with that went down the stairs and out into the night.
Peter stirred "Is he gone?" He asked.
"Barely so. Do you want me to go get him ?" She asked and Peter shook his head and lay back against his pillows.
"Don't trust him," Peter said. It broke his heart to say it and it showed in his tone.
"Why?" She asked simply.
" He's the one that told me my father was dead, he-he forced me into an orphanage. He's Ping Hai."
"Are you certain? It's been a very long time," she asked.
"I'm certain." He shook his head "I don't know what to think or who to trust anymore."
She brought his hand to her lips. "Trust me. If no one else, trust me."
"You know I do. What do we do?" he asked. "I know he's not Sing Wah but there is another force at play in my life and it's starting to scare me."
"We don't know that he is or ever was up to anything sinister"
"Seems pretty sinister to me," Peter grumbled.
"We don't know that these things were done to hurt the two of you."
"We don't know that they weren't either."
"Then we find out. We wait and watch and listen and we find out. Isn't there something about innocent until proven guilty in your previous line of work?"
"Well, I was a cop for 10 years. This won't be my first undercover rodeo." He said, "What about you, are you up to this?"
"You are the first person I have revealed myself to … ever." She said "Keeping secrets from people who have no right nor need to know … I am very good at that."
"Then that is what we do," Peter said. "I wish I understood what was going on. Or what went on in my past..."
She stroked his hair "For now... get some rest. The poison might be gone but you are exhausted. Things may not look as bleak when you have recovered. Don't write off your friend too quickly. "
He moved over in the bed to make room for her and she settled in beside him. He didn't know how things would look after he recovered. He just knew that the only person he felt he could trust at that moment was Leanne.
